The invention relates to heat transfer and storage apparatus. Applications include solar heating and cooling applications as thermal storage units which give improved heat transfer to or from the living space. Other applications include heat dissipation housings on machinery parts, engines, and the like.
Thermal storage units in solar heating and cooling applications are generally composed of large bodies of fluid, which are allowed to thermally stratify in a vertical direction. By natural convection currents, this places the warmer fluid near the top of the unit and the cooler fluid near the bottom.
In a vertical cross-sectional analysis of this type of system, one finds a much cooler fluid on one side of the thermal storage unit than on the other. The same is true of the warmer fluid. In a situation where the storage unit is used as an exterior wall of a living space, for example a Trombe wall, temperature transfer in either horizontal direction is not efficient. In heating modes, solar radiated heat is transferred to the top of the fluid area and, thus, to the internal surface toward the living space. In cooling modes, heat absorbed from the living space rises to the top of the fluid space and, thus, is distributed to the external surface.